Pia Blyton, a succubus, isn’t
ready for an official engagement since her skillset consists of setting
kitchens on fire, singing at vampire hellholes, and most embarrassingly, she
recently passed out in bed while feeding Valerio Hunan, the most eligible
incubus in Lake City. Yet somehow he turns a blind eye to all her faults and
still wants to set his marriage tattoos on her wrists.

The compulsion to have sex forces
their people to have unconventional relationships. Every three days, she has to
orgasm creating energy to survive. She can’t even live off bad sex. Unlike her,
Val can’t feed off just anyone. He consumes the energy only a succubus creates
and his hunger isn’t on a clock. Most incubi feed legally by luring multiple
succubi into marriage with money and power. Val had caught Pia by the heart
strings. Sneaky bastard.

When his food supply suddenly
stops, he’s faced with starvation. Despite Pia’s adoration, she’s not an all
you can eat buffet. He would suck her dry of all her life force within days. In
order to save her, Val forces her to leave. With nowhere to go, Pia ends up at
the last place she wants to be—her parent’s home, with nothing but her pink
suitcase and a list of all her failures.

Pia needs to pull on her big girl
panties and figure out why Val’s energy supplies have stopped arriving before
he kills some unsuspecting succubus. But the demon inside Val is closer to the
surface than either of them realize. When Pia leaves, the only thing on its
mind is tracking her down and dragging her back into its bed where she
belongs...even if it kills her.

Excerpt
One

John snatched my
offending finger and kissed the tip. “You were worried?” A shy smile tugged at
his lips. No fair.

I yanked my hand
out of his grasp. “Of course I was. It’s not like I have suitors waiting in
line.” My excuse for worrying sounded thin but I didn’t want to give John the
wrong impression. Caring about my suitors was dangerous and falling in love
against the rules. Emotional detachment had to be maintained to protect my
fragile heart and to ensure my relationship with Val would work. For an
incubus, he was oddly very possessive.

“You could have
anyone you wanted. You just don’t—”

“Want to.” I
finished the old argument between us.

“So.” He stared
at his shoes. “You met my brother.”

“Yeah, I did. He
wants to suck my soul out of my body like a juice box.” I set my hands on my
hips and gazed out at my parent’s wooded property. Val was wandering out there
under the bare branches. Somewhere.

“Sounds like
Amel.” He twisted and followed my gaze. “Did he come looking for me here?”

“No, I used the
locket you gave me last Winter Solstice.” I scowled and leaned closer so he
couldn’t escape my glare. “You didn’t tell me that wasn’t your name.” When
pressed the locket would say something and it turned out to be his brother’s
name.

His shy smile became
a grin. “I didn’t say it was either.” The dumbass’ smile faded. “Wait. You
tried to summon me using that name?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh…”

“Yeah.” Instead
of my sweet John appearing in the pentagram, his pissed off big bro showed up
and let’s just say he wasn’t happy about it.

“The city is
still intact. Did your father defeat him?”

My eyebrows shot
up. Dad? Beat a Mazzikim demon? “No.” John feared my father like no one else.
That he stood on our doorstep showed how much he wanted my forgiveness. But Dad
wasn’t a warrior. Zur-Sin, my vampire suitor and co-ruler of Lake City, however
was not only a warrior he also practiced black magic.

“How exactly are
you still alive?” His whispered question took me by surprise.

“Sin blood bound
him.”

The blood
drained from John’s face.

Reflexively, I
reached out and steadied him. “John, where have you been?”

“Yes, John,
where have you been?” Val strolled around the corner of the house, hands in
pockets, and looking quite warm in just a suit. Incubus powers?

I jumped at his
voice, an undeserved wave of guilt crashing over me as I released my hold of
John’s elbow. Our people didn’t practice love. They saw the emotion as a
weakness and I could see their point. Falling in love with a human had almost
killed me a few years ago. Sex equaled food for my people and fidelity couldn’t
be part of the equation.

My parents
managed to have a beautiful four-way loving relationship. Well, until now, with
a fourth wife on the horizon. After being raised in such an environment why
wouldn’t I crave to have the same? I smiled at Val and held out my hand.

He was willing
to give me everything, even his heart, but unlike me he’d been raised in a
cold, sterile traditional succubus household. He wanted to love me, he just
didn’t know how.

When our hands touched, I half expected to see
sparks of desire dance between our fingers. I met his pale blue stare and my
stomach fluttered. Would he ever stop affecting me this way? “John, this is
Val, my fiancé.” Valerio Hunan had recently moved to Lake City. After a
whirlwind courtship over a few days, I agreed to an engagement. My stomach
rolled as I recalled why he’d dragged me here today. He wanted my mothers to
force me to pick a date so we could publically announce our families uniting.

We had only been
living together for a few weeks. In a hotel room no less. His wives hated me.
What was the rush?

“Fiancé? I thought you didn’t want to ever get
married, Pia.” John’s gaze traveled from Val to me and back again.

“I’m beginning
to believe the same thing.” Val murmured under his breath.

I could kick
John where the sun didn’t shine. “Shut up. A lot’s changed since you left me
high and dry on my day three. So why don’t you answer my question before I ask
Val to drag your scrawny ass to your big brother.”

Excerpt
2

“Are you always
going to flirt with my suitors?” I tossed my purse on the counter in our hotel
suite and faced Val.

“Jealous?”

“I’m not sure
but I think Cooper is more excited to see you than me lately.” The last time we
visited him at his cabin in the garden district, I could swear he wagged a
non-existent tail when Val stepped out of my VW Bug. A girl could get a complex
if her fiancé stole all her lovers.

“I never flirt
with Zur-Sin.”

“I’m pretty sure
Sin considers the amount of fighting you both do as foreplay.”

Val pulled a
handkerchief out of his suit pocket and mopped his forehead. He had grown up in
a different age and still had some old fashion habits. He appeared pale and his
hands shook.

I went to him
but he withdrew from me. “What’s wrong?” I called out to Val’s live-in
assistant, Hoel, who should be home. He’d worked for Val for over fifty years.

“No. Just stay
here.” Val left me standing opened mouth in the middle of the suite. The boom
of the door echoed. He almost sounded afraid. Even when faced with a crazed
demon, Val hadn’t shown any fear. I gazed down at my petite body. Had I grown
horns?

I hurried to our
bedroom and changed into more comfortable clothes. Maybe I should call John and
have him come over early.Screw the
contract for one night.

Cooper and John
dealt directly with me when it came to our contracts. In exchange for feeding me,
they had exclusive rights to my body for that evening. Zur-Sin had a special
deal with my father concerning my being fed. Let’s just say I couldn’t break
any of the terms or my father would lose his soul. I’d made a big mistake and
my dad had paid for it.

Something savage
snarled outside our suite door and I jumped. With a racing heart, I peeked out
of the bedroom half expecting to see Amel, John’s badass brother. Nothing. My
cell phone was in my purse on the counter and this seemed like a good time to
call for help. Not that 9-1-1 responded to demon attacks but at least they
could clean up my body parts. I tiptoed toward the kitchen and froze mid step.

Pale with a thin
sheen of sweat covering his skin, Val halted just over the threshold of our
suite. His piercing blue gaze pinned me to the spot. Shadows carved the
features of his face and he appeared…

Starved.

Primal heat of
desire blasted through my body as he strode around me, staring as if he could
see right through my yoga pants and t-shirt. I twisted to follow his path.
“Val?” My voice shook and I was surprised to hear it was from fear, not
anticipation. My sweetie knew how to turn on the smolder but this type of
intensity bordered on supernatural to the power of ten.

He undid his tie
and slid it free, wrapping the ends around each hand as if wanting to strangle
someone. Me? I knew I did some things that drove him crazy like squeezing the
tooth paste tube from the middle, but that didn’t deserve capital punishment.

I swallowed with
a throat gone dry and searched the room. “Where’s Hoel?” The fallen angel
assistant-slash-shadow was never far.

“He’s occupied.”
Val’s voice caressed my flesh. Incubi were born with enough sexual magnetism to
draw the most resistant of succubi to them. Evolution, only the strong
surviving, and all that jazz made Val almost crackle with come-hither. Their
need to feed upon us gave them the skills to melt the panties off any succubus
within their vicinity.

With all that
power focused directly at me, I caught my hands already inching inside my
pants. Something was seriously wrong. My clothes felt too tight like I couldn’t
bear their touch. Every inch of my flesh tingled and my nipples popped in
aching readiness.

I’d never seen
Val this hungry. An incubus of his power and influence couldn’t afford to lose
control. Incubi could only feed off succubi and if his wives couldn’t provide
what he needed then he’d be forced to go hunt. Last time I checked raping and
pillaging were considered bad.

Normally, as his
prospective bride I’d feed him but I couldn’t afford to feed another mouth.
Hadn’t Val gone to check the mail for a package containing more vials from his
wives? The responsibility to keep him well fed was theirs, not mine. Not yet.

For a succubus,
I was considered picky when it came to my lovers. One night stands might be
good for my body but they did terrible things to my soul. I needed a few bad
boys that irked me enough not to fall in love yet dependable to be around when
I needed them.

Yeah, I know,
but I was allowed to dream big.

“Take off your
clothes.” It didn’t sound like a request.

About
the Author:

Annie Nicholas writes paranormal
romance with a twist. She has courted vampires, hunted with shifters, and slain
a dragon’s ego all with the might of her pen. Riding the wind of her
imagination, she travels beyond the restraints of reality and shares them with
anyone wanting to read her stories. Mother, daughter, and wife are some of the
other hats she wears while hiking through the hills and dales of her adopted
state of Vermont.